Drakon Outdoors – Drakon Sticks 2.0 – Heavy Duty Carbon Fiber Trekking Poles – Ultralight Collapsible Poles with Cork Handles, Flip Locks, Carbide Tips

I’m older, 230Lbs, out of shape, with a bad knee. Hiking two years ago (maybe the reason I have a bad knee now) I realized (too late) that not having poles was stupid. Before recent hiking, I bought these. Before use, I carefully tested a bit over half my weight on one pole and it slipped (getting shorter). I soon found that firm, but not difficult, was not quite enough for the red clamps. Twist the clamp tightness so the clamp is hard to close, then it doesn’t slip.I don’t expect to ever learn to correctly use two poles to reduce the effort level of walking. I tried, but I’m just not coordinated enough. My wife and I did 4 days of very challenging (for me) steep hiking and one pole set to max length was critical for me. I couldn’t have managed any of the hikes without it.Down any steep slope I need the long pole out well in front of me to keep from slipping. Maybe better shoes (or cleats) would do a similar job, but I don’t have them. Heels grip worse than toes, so down slope has more risk of slipping than up. I could not have managed without the pole. I also did a lot of walking on edges of the trail too narrow for my balance (to avoid deep slippery mud on the trail itself or for other reasons). One pole way out to the lower side made balance easy. I also needed to favor my bad knee on every big step up or down. Where the trail shape didn’t allow naturally stepping sideways to favor the bad knee, I put half my weight on the pole to favor the bad knee. Where the trail shape did easily allow favoring the bad knee, the pole still gave me more confidence in avoiding any problem balancing.In several spots, I lost my footing enough that I suddenly put most of my weight on the pole. It held perfectly (with the clamps tight enough that they had been hard to close). Until the hardest hike, my wife (who is lighter and in much better shape) wouldn’t believe that a pole would help her. My second pole was in the car when she needed it. Fortunately, we were with a couple who were younger, and had better boots, each using two poles and loaned one of those 4 to my wife. They both had pairs of the poles that cost well under half what these cost. Despite his being lighter and in better shape, the man had already damaged one of those poles by putting half his weight on it (they loaned an undamaged one to my wife).Obviously, I’m not an expert. But I’m very happy with my choice of these poles vs. poles at under half the price that weigh more per pole and would have broken when I needed them most.